Page:Statius (Mozley 1928) v1.djvu/583

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THEBAID, IV. 498–522

wonders, and “how mighty?” and he hears the roar that gives ominous signal, and measures the growing sound in blind anxiety.

Then Tiresias, as the ghosts did not yet draw nigh: “I bear you witness, goddesses, for whom we have drenched these flames and poured propitious goblets upon the rent earth, I can endure delay no further. Am I heard in vain, priest though I be? Or, if a hag of Thessaly bid you with her frenzied chant, will ye then go, or so often as a Colchian witch drives you with Scythian drugs and poisons, will Tartarus grow pale and stir affrighted: but of me have ye less regard, if I care not to raise bodies from the tomb, and bring forth urns crammed with ancient bones, and profane the gods of heaven and Erebus alike, or hunt with the sword the bloodless faces of the dead and pluck out their sickly tissues?[1] Despise not these frail years nor the cloud that is upon my darkened brow, despise it not, I warn you! I, too, can vent my wrath. I know the name whose knowing and whose speaking ye so dread, even Hecate I can confound, feared I not thee, O Thymbraean, and the high lord of the triple world,[2] who may not be known. Him—but I am silent; peaceful old age forbids. Now will I———” but Manto, votary of Phoebus, eagerly cries: “Thou art heard, O father, the pale host draws nigh. The Elysian void is flung open, the spacious shadows of the hidden region are rent, the groves and black rivers lie clear to view, and Acheron belches forth noisome mud. Smoky Phlegethon

  1. i.e., if I care not to practise evil rites.
  2. It is not clear whom or what Statius means by this mysterious phrase. Cf. Lucan, Phars. vi. 743, where a similar Power is appealed to. The Scholiast identifies with the Demiurgus, or Creator, who appears in some philosophical systems (Orphic, Gnostic, Plato’s Timaeus), but more probably Statius is using the language of magical formulae, in which such invocations as “highest,” “greatest,” “king,” without any particular application are common. Cf. the Graeco-Egyptian magic spells edited by Wessely (Griech. Zauberpapyri, 1888), or by Eitrem (Pap. Osloenses, 1925). Typhon (= Seti) is frequently called on in similar language.

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